RE: Tough times with the guitar

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edguerin

Posts: 1589
Joined: Dec. 24 2007
From: Siegburg, Alemania

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to Ailsa)

Good luck!

_____________________________

Ed

El aficionado solitario
Alemania

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date May 21 2010 8:48:06

Ron.M

Posts: 7051
Joined: Jul. 7 2003
From: Scotland

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to Ailsa)

quote:

Oh I would never beat Dave. I have other ways of getting what I want

That actually put me in mind of something from way back in my past..

When I was in my 20's my old American manager who had served in Vietnam called that "pussy power".

First time I'd ever heard the expression and was puzzled, but later on realized what he was talking about.

He said that was the reason he married a Latina lady, as lots of men in the States were held hostage to it ....

cheers,

Ron

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date May 21 2010 10:38:32

ToddK

Posts: 2961
Joined: Dec. 6 2004

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to edguerin)

Just listen to Ricardo!! Thats what i always do

It works!

You'll be fine Ailsa, just keep on keepin on..

TK

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date May 21 2010 13:56:36

Ron.M

Posts: 7051
Joined: Jul. 7 2003
From: Scotland

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to Arash)

quote:

there are lot of similarities between some old style persian singing and Cante.

Hi Arash,

I love that "microtonal" way of singing myself, including Arabic stuff and really like that "call to prayer"... a palo seco stuff you hear from the minarets the most.

But generally it sounds "sweeter" than Flamenco, kinda playing around the main drone sound with microtones, which is great, but I think Flamenco singing has a bigger tonal palette and constantly surprises you.

Actually I remember going along the Med (on a working boat) and passing from Cadiz to Gib listening to Flamenco (por Radio

) and a couple of days later waking up in the morning and listening to what initially sounded like Flamenco, only to realize it was Turkish/Greek/Cypriot stuff!

You can certainly hear the roots of Flamenco all the way along there.

I loved Rob MacKillop's (fantastic old-Scottish stringed instrument specialist) description of going to see a Turkish Orchestra perform after winning a grant to visit Turkey for a study period....

"Wonderfully 'out of tune'!"

That's what I love as well!.

cheers,

Ron

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date May 22 2010 10:27:47

cathulu

Posts: 950
Joined: Dec. 15 2006
From: Vancouver, Canukistan

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to Ailsa)

Hey, this speaks to me! Ailsa, I am amazed at the progress you have made in three short years. As you get better, you sound worse in your own ears cause you are starting to listen to what you are doing, rather than concentrating on the fingers plucking the strings. So tone production is now starting to become important to you, as well as rhythm and being in the groove.

The frustration is a good sign. At least that is what I convince myself, as I am totally frustrated myself!

We need another challenge this fall / winter to push us out of our doledrums...

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date May 25 2010 21:55:03

mrMagenta

Posts: 942
Joined: Oct. 25 2006
From: Sweden

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to edguerin)

It's interesting to see how differently all of us are learning to play

My way of learning has been by adding very little new material at a time. Today, 4 and some years after I started with flamenco my repertoire is still tiny, almost silly. Ailsa, I know from hearing you play on the foro that you have way more material than me. To me, your rate of learning is very good.

I've kicked myself for learning new material so slowly.. at times even questioning my memory functions etc. VERY FRUSTRATING.. So I've definitely had some tough times with the guitar, but there are (still rare) moments when I feel that I've internalized the bits I know to such a degree that theres enough space for expression to jam myself in there. What a f%¤#%¤g relief, that there actually is some payoff :-D Even if it's just a couple of very standard solea compases, they can be like vessels and carry a lot!

My feeling is that there's a ketchup effect.. what you learn in the microcosm of a single solea compas can open up a lot of things very quickly. I think I've seen some signs of it.. I HOPE it is so :-) Perhaps it is a mirage! ... .. Look RICARDO! TEARS!

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date May 26 2010 13:03:28

mark indigo

Posts: 3625
Joined: Dec. 5 2007

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to cathulu)

quote:

As you get better, you sound worse in your own ears

another reason for this is you move the goal posts. once you reach one goal, you set your sights on yet higher achievements.

as you progress your ear also improves, so your expectations of yourself get higher.

once you were probably really impressed by yourself when you learnt 2 chords and a rasgueao and managed to string them together to play one compas over and over.... now you are not satisfied that you can't play indefinitely creating endless variations on the compas!

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date May 26 2010 13:15:07

Ailsa

Posts: 2277
Joined: Apr. 17 2007
From: South East England

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to Ailsa)

Hello all, well after my big whinge a while ago I thought I'd update you, in case it helps anyone else in a crisis!

First thing I did was to stop playing full pieces - I reckoned I'd got into habits that I wanted to forget so best to take a break from them and re-learn them later with better habits I thought.

All I let myself play was compas of the main palos - tangos, tientos, bulerias, alegrias, solea, fandangos. That meant I could carry on playing for dance classes, so I didn't lose the habit of playing in front of people.

Then I started in on right hand technique - changed my hand position, which was hell because such a habit, but now I've done it I can hear I have more control and a better tone.

Now starting to work on left hand, really trying to get it accurate, because I realised lots of the buzzy notes were due to poor placing of left hand fingers. I'm doing that through a combination of exercises and libre palos, tarantas, minera, really trying to get every note clean.

And I'm feeling much more positive about the whole thing

I don't plan on playing any performance pieces for a while yet, and I worried I would forget them all, but actually I haven't. And my hope is that when I go back to them, they will sound better than before.

Will let you know how it goes.

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 20 2010 10:10:34

Ron.M

Posts: 7051
Joined: Jul. 7 2003
From: Scotland

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to Ailsa)

Good stuff Ailsa!

You can never re-visit the basics often enough IMO as those foundations will dictate the whole of your toque regardless of how nimble fingered you become at playing the fancy "twiddly bits".

Good too that you are playing for your dance class, so there would be no harm in sticking in a simple, end-of-phrase run or a repetitive falseta (ie as in Soleares or Alegrias) just as a break in the basic chording compás and rasgueado.

Individual falsetas are always the way to go in Flamenco.
They are useful....set pieces are not.

cheers,

Ron

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 20 2010 12:13:22

mrMagenta

Posts: 942
Joined: Oct. 25 2006
From: Sweden

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to edguerin)

Thanks for the encouraging update. Sounds like you're on the right track.
Every now and then it feels good to 'reboot' and look at technique and basic playing with as if it were the first time again.

ps. Now I'm off to pick up my package from strings by mail. Feels like Christmas (except the scorching heat)! .. even with all the frustrations, playing the guitar is still what I want to do most of the time. :-)

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 21 2010 8:31:20

orsonw

Posts: 1934
Joined: Jul. 4 2009
From: London

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to Ailsa)

quote:

All I let myself play was compas of the main palos

Here's Tomatito- 'all' he is playing is compas, yes with two or three falsetas but really it's all about the compas. I love Tomatito in the 80's, accompanying and playing a Conde blanca.

I agree playing torque libre and the rest is good for practicing but it is this kind of exciting compas playing that I love with just the odd blinding pulgar moment thrown in; check out his cierre at 1.19

Good luck Ailsa I personally think you're on the right track to becoming a good flamenco guitarist. Remember even a relatively simply falseta like Ron's beginner's challenge played well and with conviction will sound great thrown in at the right moment amongst some soild compas. Good compas is not easy but as Ron says we don't need to be virtuoso to be flamenco. I turned up for a job the other night and I discovered my 6th string was broken. It was for a professional Andalucian dancer I hadn't worked with before so I was a bit uneasy. I was a bit limited but she or the audience couldn't care less or notice but they were happy to hear strong compas. She even paid the compliment of saying I had duende when I play compas- that's a big compliment as far as I'm concerned.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 22 2010 21:15:25

ronzy60

Posts: 33
Joined: Dec. 8 2009

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to edguerin)

For some time I have felt that there is a possible project for members of foro to build a collection of variation of short compass strumming for the various Palos.
I don’t mean complete pieces only say 1 or 2 compasses of interesting rhythmic strum or chord patterns from basic level upwards. I would love to produce something like this but I’m partially blind and just typing out a letter for me is a major undertaking. Maybe it’s not a very good idea, and is problematic, what do you think?

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 23 2010 20:25:26

Ricardo

Posts: 14806
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to ronzy60)

quote:

ORIGINAL: ronzy60

For some time I have felt that there is a possible project for members of foro to build a collection of variation of short compass strumming for the various Palos.
I don’t mean complete pieces only say 1 or 2 compasses of interesting rhythmic strum or chord patterns from basic level upwards. I would love to produce something like this but I’m partially blind and just typing out a letter for me is a major undertaking. Maybe it’s not a very good idea, and is problematic, what do you think?

it's a very good idea actually. For folks like McGuire and myself it is a slight conflict of interest as we have lessons for sale on other websites of such material. But a collective effort of foro members would be a good idea I think. We need one person to be in charge of organizing contributions of what would be truly the graduating levels from basic to advanced. There are many things archived already that might be a place to start looking for material already uploaded.

For example here is a great example of basic bulerias:

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www.ricardomarlow.com

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 23 2010 23:21:06

ronzy60

Posts: 33
Joined: Dec. 8 2009

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to edguerin)

Thanks for your support Ricardo, I suspected my suggestion would create some conflict but there is no substitute for personal lessons. It was my intention to collect a body of material that could be accessible to all, not in place of focused personal teaching. In my career I found it helped to have other material to compliment study. It always helps to have another point of view to reinforce a line of inquiry.

Ronzy

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 24 2010 0:03:02

orsonw

Posts: 1934
Joined: Jul. 4 2009
From: London

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to Ricardo)

quote:

a collection of variation of short compass strumming for the various Palos.

I think a complete collection is a daunting task as there are very many possible variations. But maybe rather than trying to come up with a comprehensive collection foro members could post their favorite compas variation. It could build from there, rather like the cante accompaniment thread.

In the mean time I suggest listening to or watching players on youtube that you like and learn what they're doing.
Anyway it's more flamenco to learn by copying than reading tabs and I think it's easier to get the correct feel and phrasing, which can never be written down exactly.
(But of course I am ignorant! I'm not a trained musician.)

I have found youtube a very good source, for example from that Tomatito video I posted I have just learnt a few variations.

Jason has some good lessons on youtube if you need things more broken down, Ruben Diaz also has some good compas lessons on youtube for various palos.
I can also recommend joining Jason's site, he has many good lessons with lots of examples of compas variations, remates, llamadas etc..

We are very fortunate these days. In the past there was no access unless one was in Spain, now with recordings and youtube there's a rich source of material.
Still maybe it's good that it's not all completely on a plate but still takes some discovering, that's one of flamencos great qualities- it is endless, one can never know it all.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 24 2010 18:49:25

ronzy60

Posts: 33
Joined: Dec. 8 2009

[Deleted]

Post has been moved to the Recycle Bin at Jul. 24 2010 21:05:03

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 24 2010 21:01:41

ronzy60

Posts: 33
Joined: Dec. 8 2009

RE: Tough times with the guitar (in reply to orsonw)

I’ll take that as a no vote then……

I’m not proposing a definitive collection that has been put together in a week; I was thinking more on the lines of what you highlighted - a thread of interesting and creative playing from beginner’s level upwards. Many years ago Rafael Riqueni and a friend of mine from Seville, Peter Holloway who works as a professional flamenco guitarist, visited my home and we spent some hours playing guitar. I recorded the event on my tape recorded. Rafael played some really interesting chord progressions that to the best of my knowledge he has never recorded commercially, and it seemed a shame that they were not available to all. I have no problem with Jason’s excellent channel and I’m not seeking lessons. I just suggest that it would be more inclusive for members of Foro to contribute some good examples and Ricardos excellent example makes my point….. I’ll leave it at that.

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Jul. 24 2010 21:06:44